I talked his
proposal over with Mr. R. A. Streatfeild, Butler's literary executor,
and, having obtained his approval, set to work. From November 1907
to May 1910, inclusive, the New Quarterly published six groups of
notes and the long note on "Genius" (pp. 174-8 post). The experience
gained in selecting, arranging, and editing these items has been of
great use to me and I thank the proprietor and editor of the New
Quarterly for permission to republish such of the notes as appeared
in their review.
In preparing this book I began by going through the notes again and
marking all that seemed to fall within certain groups roughly
indicated by the arrangement in the review. I had these selected
items copied, distributed them among those which were already in
print, shuffled them and turned them over, meditating on them,
familiarising myself with them and tentatively forming new groups.
While doing this I was continually gleaning from the books more notes
which I had overlooked, and making such verbal alterations as seemed
necessary to avoid repetition, to correct obvious errors and to
remove causes of reasonable offence. The ease with which two or more
notes would condense into one was sometimes surprising, but there
were cases in which the language had to be varied and others in which
a few words had to be added to bridge over a gap; as a rule, however,
the necessary words were lying ready in some other note.
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